The Correlation Between Social Media Engagement and Academic Performance of Students in Pakistan During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

The most recent crisis the world had faced was the COVID-19 pandemic. Countries had been compelled to halt educational activities. Pakistan too, had followed same online mode of teaching-learning using various social media platforms. Pandemic environment produced insecurities among the lives of students. Consequently, students experienced negative emotions like depression, stress, anxiety, panic, and low emotional stability. It was also indicated that students started using social media extensively that affected their academic achievements. For this reason, the current study aimed at investigating COVID-19 environment and its effect on students’ use of social media and their academic performance. The study was descriptive in nature and survey design was employed. University students of Lahore were selected as sample after considering delimitations. A specially designed questionnaire was used as the tool of the study and used after ensuring validity and reliability. Data was collected after considering all the ethical concerns during the study. The findings of the study indicated a significant relationship between COVID-19 environment and use of social media. The relationship was also significant for COVID-19 environment and academic performance. A significant effect of COVID-19 environment resulted in the use of social media and academic performance too. The study suggested developing a certain online education model with improved mental and emotional health and progressive academic achievements for future researchers. Policy makers, educational administrators, academicians, and instructors may find the results beneficial to develop initiatives for the unstable educational situations during universal emergencies.

Keywords: Social Media, Education, Covid 19, Academic Performance